Canberra Conversations: Beth Mitchell

It was one of 39 schools in the territory slated to be closed by the Stanhope Government five years ago but Dickson College has just been described by the head of the ACT Education and Training Directorate as "the best school we have", while its principal has been named Public Education Principal of the Year.

Beth Mitchell is the lumberjack turned garbo then English teacher who has transformed the school into one that lives up to its motto: "Excellence, opportunity, community," as she told Alex Sloan during the 666 ABC Canberra Conversations Hour.

Dickson College's flamboyant principal since 2009, Mitchell says the position is her ultimate role.

"It's the best job in the world. I am so lucky that I have this job. I say this all the time. My students know that. They know that I love coming to school."

With a childhood spent in Australia, Britain, then Canada, a determined Mitchell finished school and headed up to the timber mills in the north of British Columbia to try to earn enough money to return here. She'd heard that big sums were being earned by workers in the mills - the only problem was they weren't being paid to women. Still, drawing on her unusual determination she became one of the first female lumberjacks.

"They decided to hire five women and we had 30 days to prove that we were strong enough that we could do it and that we could pull our weight. So it was actually pulling on the dry chain and stacking lumber and doing really heavy physical work."

Mitchell went on to do that work for a year and in 1978 arrived back in Australia with $5000.

"I knew from the minute I landed here: 'Yep, this is it'."

Soon afterwards she met the love of her life, Stuart, while studying at ANU and gave up law to travel with him to Uluru, where she took a job driving a garbage truck.

After that career foray, Mitchell ended up back in Canberra and decided to train as a teacher.

"[It's] so much better than a law degree. And I ended up being a school principal and not a lawyer and for that I am really thankful."

All these years later, she's convinced it was her calling.

"I knew it was what I had to do. I knew it was the most important job in the world."